The Warded Man (50 page)

“I’ve heard stories of this man,” Rojer said. “Spun a few myself. I thought he was only a myth, but there can’t be two men painted like that, who kill corelings with their bare hands.”

“You called him the Warded Man,” Leesha said, remembering. Rojer nodded. “That’s what he’s called in the tales. No one knows his real name,” he said. “I heard of him over a year ago when one of the duke’s Jongleurs passed through the Western hamlets. I thought he was just an ale story, but it seems the duke’s man was telling true.”

“What did he say?” Leesha asked.

“That the Warded Man wanders the naked night, hunting demons,” Rojer said. “He shuns human contact, appearing only when he needs supplies and paying with ancient gold. From time to time, you hear tales of him rescuing someone on the road.”

“Well, we can bear witness to that,” Leesha said. “But if he can kill demons, why has no one tried to learn his secrets?”

Rojer shrugged. “According to the tales, no one dares. Even the dukes themselves are terrified of him, especially after what happened in Lakton.”

“What happened?” Leesha asked.

“The story goes that the dockmasters of Lakton sent spies to steal his combat wards,” Rojer said. “A dozen men, all armed and armored. Those he didn’t kill were crippled for life.”

“Creator!” Leesha gasped, covering her mouth. “What kind of monster are we traveling with?”

“Some say he’s part demon himself,” Rojer agreed, “the result of a coreling raping a woman on the road.”

He started suddenly, his face coloring as he realized what he’d said, but his thoughtless words had the opposite effect, breaking the spell of her fear. “That’s ridiculous,” she said, shaking her head.

“Others say he’s no demon at all,” Rojer pressed on, “but the Deliverer himself, come to lift the Plague. Tenders have prayed to him and begged his blessings.”

“I’d sooner believe he’s half coreling,” Leesha said, though she sounded less than sure.

They traveled on in uncomfortable silence. A day ago, Leesha had been unable to get a moment’s peace from Rojer, the Jongleur constantly trying to impress her with his tales and music, but now he kept his eyes down, brooding. Leesha knew he was hurting, and part of her wanted to offer comfort, but a bigger part needed comfort of her own. She had nothing to give.

Soon after, the Warded Man rode back to them. “You two walk too slow,” he said, dismounting. “If we want to save ourselves a fourth night on the road, we’ll need to cover thirty miles today. You two ride. I’ll run alongside.”

“You shouldn’t be running,” Leesha said. “You’ll tear the stitches I put in your thigh.”

“It’s all healed,” the Warded Man said. “Just needed a night’s rest.”

“Nonsense,” Leesha said, “that gash was an inch deep.” As if to prove her point, she went over to him and knelt, lifting the loose robe away from his muscular, tattooed leg.

But when she removed the bandage to examine the wound, her eyes widened in shock. New, pink flesh had already grown to knit the wound together, her stitches poking from otherwise healthy skin.

“That’s impossible,” she said.

“It was just a scratch,” the Warded Man said, sliding a wicked blade through the stitches and picking them out one by one. Leesha opened her mouth, but the Warded Man rose and went back to Twilight Dancer, taking the reins and holding them out to her.

“Thank you,” she said numbly, taking the reins. In one moment, everything she knew about healing had been called into question. Who was this man?
What
was he?

Twilight Dancer cantered down the road, and the Warded Man ran alongside in long, tireless strides, easily keeping pace with the horse as the miles melted away under his warded feet. When they rested, it was from Rojer and Leesha’s desire and not his. Leesha watched him subtly, searching for signs of fatigue, but there were none. When they made camp at last, his breath was smooth and regular as he fed and watered his horse, even as she and Rojer groaned and rubbed the aches from their limbs.

There was an awkward silence about the campfire. It was well past dark, but the Warded Man walked freely about the camp, collecting firewood and removing Twilight Dancer’s barding, brushing the great stallion down. He moved from the horse’s circle to their own without a thought to the wood demons lurking about. One leapt at him from the cover of the brush, but the Warded Man paid no mind as it slammed into the wards barely an inch from his back.

While Leesha prepared supper, Rojer limped bowlegged around the circle, attempting to walk off the stiffness of a day’s hard riding.

“I think my stones are crushed from all that bouncing,” he groaned.

“I’ll have a look, if you like,” Leesha said. The Warded Man snorted.

Rojer looked at her ruefully. “I’ll be all right,” he managed, continuing to pace. He stopped suddenly a moment later, staring down the road.

They all looked up, seeing the eerie orange light of the flame demon’s mouth and eyes long before the coreling itself came into sight, shrieking and running hard on all fours.

“How is it that the flame demons don’t burn the entire forest down?” Rojer wondered, watching the trailing wisps of fire behind the creature.

“You’re about to find out,” the Warded Man said. Rojer found the amusement in his voice even more unsettling than his usual monotone.

The words were barely spoken before howls heralded the approach of a pack of wood demons, three strong, barreling down the road after the flame demon. One of them had another flame demon hanging limply from its jaws, dripping black ichor.

So occupied was the flame demon with outrunning its pursuers, it failed to notice the other wood demons gathering in the scrub at the edges of the road until one pounced, pinning the hapless creature and eviscerating it with its back talons. It shrieked horribly, and Leesha covered her ears from the sound.

“Woodies hate flame demons,” the Warded Man explained when it was over, his eyes glinting in pleasure at the kill.

“Why?” Rojer asked.

“Because wood demons are vulnerable to demonfire,” Leesha said. The Warded Man looked up at her in surprise, then nodded.

“Then why don’t the flame demons set them on fire?” Rojer asked.

The Warded Man laughed. “Sometimes they do,” he said, “but flammable or no, there isn’t a flame demon alive that’s a match in a fight with a wood demon. Woodies are second only to rock demons in strength, and they’re nearly invisible within the borders of the forest.”

“The Creator’s Great Plan,” Leesha said. “Checks and balances.”

“Nonsense,” the Warded Man countered. “If the flame demons burned everything away, there would be nothing left for them to hunt. Nature found a way to solve the problem.”

“You don’t believe in the Creator?” Rojer asked.

“We have enough problems already,” the Warded Man answered, and his scowl made it clear that he had no desire to pursue the subject.

“There are some that call you the Deliverer,” Rojer dared.

The Warded Man snorted. “There’s no Deliverer coming to save us, Jongleur,” he said. “You want demons dead in this world, you have to kill them yourself.”

As if in response, a wind demon bounced off Twilight Dancer’s wardnet, filling the area with a brief flash of light. The stallion dug at the dirt with his hooves, as if eager to leap from the circle and do battle, but he stayed in place, waiting for a command from his master.

“How is it the horse stands so unafraid?” Leesha asked. “Even Messengers stake down their horses at night to keep them from bolting, but yours seems to
want
to fight.”

“I’ve been training Twilight Dancer since he was foaled,” the Warded Man said. “He’s always been warded, so he’s never learned to fear corelings. His sire was the biggest, most aggressive beast I could find, and his dam the same.”

“But he seemed so gentle when we rode him,” Leesha said.

“I’ve taught him to channel his aggressive urges,” the Warded Man said, pride evident in his normally emotionless tone. “He returns kindness, but if he’s threatened, or I am, he’ll attack without hesitation. He once crushed the skull of a wild boar that would have gored me for sure.”

Finished with the flame demons, the wood demons began to circle the wards, drawing closer and closer. The Warded Man strung his yew bow and took out his quiver of heavy-tipped arrows, but he ignored the creatures as they slashed at the barrier and were thrown back. When they finished their meal, he selected an unmarked arrow and took an etching tool from his warding kit, slowly inscribing the shaft with wards.

“If we weren’t here …” Leesha asked.

“I would be out there,” the Warded Man answered, not looking up at her. “Hunting.”

Leesha nodded, and was quiet for a time, watching him. Rojer shifted uncomfortably at her obvious fascination.

“Have you seen my home?” she asked softly.

The Warded Man looked at her curiously, but made no reply.

“If you’ve come from the south, you must’ve come through the Hollow,” Leesha said.

The Warded Man shook his head. “I give the hamlets a wide berth,” he said. “The first person to see me runs off, and before long I’m met by a cluster of angry men with pitchforks.”

Leesha wanted to protest, but she knew the people of Cutter’s Hollow would act much as he described. “They’re only afraid,” she said lamely.

“I know,” the Warded Man said. “And so I leave them in peace. There’s more to the world than hamlets and cities, and if the price of one is losing the other …” He shrugged. “Let people hide in their homes, caged like chickens. Cowards deserve no better.”

“Then why did you save us from the demons?” Rojer asked.

The Warded Man shrugged. “Because you’re human and they’re abominations,” he said. “And because you struggled to survive, right up to the last minute.”

“What else could we have done?” Rojer asked.

“You’d be amazed how many just lie down and wait for the end,” the Warded Man said.

They made good time the fourth day out from Angiers. Neither the Warded Man nor his stallion seemed to know fatigue, Twilight Dancer easily paced his master’s loping run.

When they finally made camp for the night, Leesha made a thin soup from the Warded Man’s remaining stores, but it barely filled their bellies. “What are we going to do for food?” she asked him, as the last of it vanished down Rojer’s throat.

The Warded Man shrugged. “I hadn’t planned for company,” he said as he sat back, carefully painting wards onto his fingernails.

“Two more days of riding is a long way to go without food,” Rojer lamented.

“You want to cut the trip in half,” the Warded Man said, blowing on a nail to dry it, “we could travel by night, as well. Twilight Dancer can outrun most corelings, and I can kill the rest.”

“Too dangerous,” Leesha said. “We’ll do Cutter’s Hollow no good if we all get killed. We’ll just have to travel hungry.”

“I’m not leaving the wards at night,” Rojer agreed, rubbing his stomach regretfully.

The Warded Man pointed to a coreling stalking the camp. “We could eat that,” he said.

“You can’t be serious!” Rojer cried in disgust.

“Just the
thought
is sickening,” Leesha agreed.

“It’s not so bad, really,” the man said.

“You’ve actually
eaten
demon?” Rojer asked.

“I do what I have to, to survive,” the man replied.

“Well, I’m certainly not going to eat demon meat,” Leesha said.

“Me neither,” Rojer agreed.

“Very well,” the Warded Man sighed, getting up and taking his bow, a quiver of arrows, and a long spear. He stripped off his robe, revealing his warded flesh, and moved to the edge of the circle. “I’ll see what I can hunt up.”

“You don’t need to …!” Leesha called, but the man ignored her. A moment later, he had vanished into the night.

It was more than an hour before he returned, carrying a plump pair of rabbits by the ears. He handed the catch to Leesha, and returned to his seat, picking up the tiny warding brush.

“You make music?” he asked Rojer, who had just finished re-stringing his fiddle and was plucking at the strings, adjusting the tensions.

Rojer jumped at the comment. “Y-yes,” he managed.

“Will you play something?” the Warded Man asked. “I can’t remember the last time I heard music.”

“I would,” Rojer said sadly, “but the bandits kicked my bow into the woods.”

The man nodded and sat in thought a moment. Then he stood suddenly, producing a large knife. Rojer shrank back, but the man just stepped back out of the circle. A wood demon hissed at him, but the Warded Man hissed right back, and the demon shied away.

He returned soon after with a supple length of wood, shearing the bark with his wicked blade. “How long was it?” he asked.

“E-eighteen inches,” Rojer stuttered.

The Warded Man nodded, cutting the branch to the appropriate length and walking over to Twilight Dancer. The stallion did not react as he cut a length of hair from its tail. He notched the wood and tied the horsehair flat and thick on one side. He knelt next to Rojer, bending the branch. “Tell me when the tension is right,” he said, and Rojer laid the fingers of his crippled hand on the hair. When he was satisfied, the Warded Man tied the other end and handed it to him.